What: American University experts are available for commentary and analysis on a variety of topics including police violence and police brutality, criminal justice reform and race and ethnicity, systemic racism and white privilege, and other related issues.  

When: April 20, 2021 - ongoing

 

Where: Via Skype, Zoom, email, or telephone

 

EXPERTS AVAILABLE:

POLICING/CRIMINAL JUSTICE/REFORMS

 

RICHARD BENNETT, CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM Richard Bennett is a professor at the School of Public Affair. He is an expert in comparative criminology, comparative criminal justice, and police organization and procedures. Prof. Bennett has published extensively in the area of cross-national crime, policing and comparative police systems. 

TALISA CARTER, CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM AND RACE/ETHNICITY

TaLisa Carter is an assistant professor at the School of Public Affairs. Her research focuses on understanding the interactions of deviance, social organizations, and race. She previously worked as a Deputy Corrections Officer in Savannah, Georgia. She can comment on issues related to the criminal justice system and race/ethnicity.

ANGELA J. DAVIS, RACISM AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE Angela J. Davis, professor of law at AU's Washington College of Law, is an expert in criminal law and procedure with a specific focus on prosecutorial power and racism in the criminal justice system. Davis is the author of Arbitrary Justice: The Power of the American Prosecutor (Oxford University Press 2007). She is also the editor of Policing the Black Man: Arrest, Prosecution, and Imprisonment (Penguin Random House 2017).

MICHELLE ENGERT, CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM Michelle Engert is a senior scholar-in-residence at the School of Public Affairs, joined AU after a diverse career as a trial attorney and as a policy advisor. She served as a trial attorney with the New Mexico Public Defender Department in Santa Fe, before her appointment as an assistant federal public defender in the Offices of the Federal Public Defender for the District of New Mexico and later for the District of Maryland in the Baltimore Division. She has also worked in the national criminal justice policy arena as a senior counsel in the Office for Access to Justice at the United States Department of Justice and as an attorney advisor at the Defender Services Office in the Administrative Office of the United States Courts.

JANICE IWAMA, POLICE AND RACISM Janice Iwama is an assistant professor in AU’s School of Public Affairs. Her research focuses on examining local conditions and social processes that influence hate crimes, gun violence, racial profiling, and the victimization of immigrants. Iwama has served as a co-principal investigator and lead researcher in projects funded by the Department of Justice Civil Rights Unit and the National Institute of Justice.

KAREEM JORDAN, RACE AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE Kareem Jordan, associate professor and Director of Diversity and Inclusion in the School of Public Affairs, has written extensively about the role of race in criminal court sentencing and juvenile court outcomes. His research also focuses on perceptions of racial profiling in stores and airports, particularly when it comes to blacks and Latinos.

CYNTHIA E. JONES, EVIDENCE, CRIMINAL LAW, CRIMINAL PROCEDURE Washington College of Law Prof. Cynthia E. Jones is president of The Sentencing Project Board of Directors and chair of the Board of the Civil Rights Corps. She has written numerous articles and co-authored publications in the areas of criminal law, wrongful convictions, criminal discovery reform, cash bail reform, and eliminating racial disparities in the criminal justice system, and has produced two educational short films: “Fighting Evidence with Evidence,” and “Bail in America: The Color of Pretrial Justice.”

 JENNY ROBERTS, CRIMINAL LAW, CRIMINAL CONVICTIONS

Roberts is a Professor of Law at American University Washington College of Law, where she co-directs the Criminal Justice Clinic and teaches Criminal Law. She has written numerous articles on plea bargaining, misdemeanors, and collateral consequences of criminal convictions. Roberts was previously a public defender in Manhattan and a law clerk in the Southern District of New York.

ORISANMI BURTON, RACE AND RACIALIZATION

Orisanmi Burton is an assistant professor of anthropology whose work lies at the intersection of race and racialization, crime and punishment, policing and security, social movements, and Black studies.

 

NEWS MEDIA AND COMMUNICATION

LEONARD STEINHORN, POLITICAL COMMUNICATION, CIVIL RIGHTS AND RACE RELATIONS

Steinhorn is a professor of communication. His expertise includes American politics, culture and media; the presidency and presidential elections; political strategy and communication; recent American history; the 1960s; race relations in America. Steinhorn is available to discuss civil rights and race relations in America, America in the 60’s and the protests from 1968, political communication, and presidential politics and elections.

 

JOHN C. WATSON, FIRST AMENDMENT AND JOURNALISM LAW

Watson is an associate professor in the School of Communication’s journalism division. His expertise includes First Amendment theory, Journalism ethics, communication law, newsroom diversity, free speech, urban issues coverage, privacy, indecency and obscenity, censorship, press coverage of trials and the law, police sketches, and racial profiling.

 

SHERRI WILLIAMS, PORTRAYAL OF PROTESTORS AND MEDIA, GENDER AND POLICE BRUTALITY

Williams is an Assistant Professor in the School of Communication. Her expertise lies at the intersection of social media, social justice, mass media and how people of color use and are represented by these mediums. Williams can discuss the portrayal of protestors, news media's patterns of framing of protests and dissent with stigma in the United States, especially during Black liberation movements. She can also discuss how Black transgender women, Black transgender men and non-gender conforming people are also vulnerable to police brutality, as well as how Black cisgender women are also victims to fatal police force and even sexual assault.

 

Contact: AU Communications, at 202-885-5950 or via e-mail at [email protected]   

 

About American University

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